BioShock Critic Reviews

It’s ingenious, enthralling, and a masterpiece of the most epic proportions. So without further delay, would you kindly enter Rapture so that you too can experience the best that video games have to offer?

BioShock is the ultimate rarity: not only does it live up to its lofty promise, but exceeds it through simple, old fashioned talent and imagination - not to mention verve, style,class, wit, and sheer bloody-minded ambition. It takes the tired, worn-out FPS genre by the scruff of the neck, reinvents and bend it out of shape in such a breathtaking fashion that it's going to take something very special to top this in the months and years ahead.

Amazingly written and beautifully constructed, it's a complete emotional rollercoaster which we can't drawn any parallels with...You'll be playing this game for months to come, exchanging story elements to build up the bigger picture, and arguing about what it all means.

Taken as a whole, as an experience that's richly and utterly complete, and one that engages the player in a constant dialogue, BioShock is virtually unassailable. And that makes you feel good.

An unparalleled achievement. No other game comes even remotely close to it in terms of raw emotional connection.

What if a game's narrative was as intricate and as immersive as its graphics? What if as much attention went into dialogue and atmosphere as went into pixel shaders and high-resolution textures? What then? Ladies and gentlemen, the answer is BioShock, one of the most playable, thought-provoking, and just downright impressive games to emerge on a home console since, well, ever.

The most creative and compelling experience of its generation, BioShock is a stunning piece of work. It blends great ideas with brilliant gameplay, a superbly immersive storyline and quite simply gets just about everything right.

Really, though, the only glaring weakness we can find in BioShock is that it may be too unusual, too original, too artistic and too genius to be embraced by the general public. Please don't let this game become that forgotten, one-of-a-kind masterpiece.

HOLY SH..! With stunning visuals, immersive sound, and an epic story, BioShock hearkens back to a time of fantasy and wonder, blending elements of Jules Verne and John Carpenter into a cinematic masterpiece of sci-fi horror that you won’t want to miss. I can’t think of any game more deserving of a perfect ten than BioShock.

The first-person shooter's great looking, has an engrossing storyline, a perfect balance of action and exploration and a totally customizable combat system that can be described as nothing less than video game rapture.

The most salient fact about BioShock is that it's different. If it doesn't sell well, perhaps it's time to abandon hope and resign ourselves to the eternal recurrence of space dungeons and World War II. Games like BioShock are what we need. They are what we deserve.

It will challenge you, it will move you, and it will force you to make hard decisions. It is unbelievably immersive and tenaciously inventive. It is a game that sets the bar high for others to follow—for its art direction, narrative, and gameplay.

Bioshock is that rare game where the plot, environment, and combat are all steps above the normal video game experience. Games at their very best, like this one, can create amazing alternative worlds for us to inhabit, doing those things we can't do in real life. This is one product the free market should be very happy to have.

One of the most engrossing experiences in the history of interactive entertainment.

You'll notice really small but crucial touches throughout your descent in Rapture that make it easily one of the most engaging, fun and unique shooters of any console. Whether you're looking for an action game, an adventure game, a good story, a unique concept, or hell, even an RPG, BioShock's brilliant campaign will make you realize that the first person shooter genre can and needs to be so much more than it is.

BioSchock is amazing. Not only are its visuals, music, sound, gameplay and plot superb, but it's highly polished and runs beautifully on the 360 without any noticeable drop in frame rate.

BioShock is a title that gamers spend their whole lives waiting to play. Something that delivers on an absurdly high level in every department, and one that never dips in quality for the 15-20 hours that it lasts.

Everyone will play it differently, and have a different experience. Some like myself will find it drenched in tension and atmosphere, having run into many a situation where the poop was scared out of me. Others, like a friend of mine, will claim that its intuitiveness, combative freedom, and creativity puts it above the spiritual predecessor "System Shock 2," and wonder at how convincing the whole affair can be.

The art direction is outstanding; mixing art deco architecture, classic 1950’s graphic design and tons of great old music from the early jazz era that adds a musty creepiness to the overall atmosphere of the game. It’s definitely not your typical Space Marine fare, and that’s a very good thing.

A technical masterpiece with a story that reaches too far—but Andrew Ryan would have it no other way.